Battletech battle of Antietam

During the US Civil War the battle of Antietam was fought in 1862. It was the single bloodiest battle in US history. While the Union took horrendous losses, it managed to blunt the Confederacy’s first attempt at an invasion of northern territory.

Last night history was refought. With mechs.

My buddy made a hex map of Antietam for use in a particular fully historical game. I saw it an immediately knew it had to be turned into a Battletech match. We made a few on the fly rule choices. Rivers on the board are drawn on hex edges so we treated them as existing on either side of the edge, with the exception of road which stayed in place as super sturdy bridges, played as roads.The original game’s scenario was played to 15 with the Union having to touch 10 hexes marked with stars to capture them and win. Confederates could retake hexes. We decided to keep these parameters.

The forces were relatively evenly matched. Notable parts of the forces included the Union with an upgunned Urbie running an AC20 cannon, and the Confederate side with a command center which provided a +1 initiative.

Initially the Confederates could deploy no further than the outline of the stars. I took control and placed them in a defensive line, intending to hold the Union assault and find out where the spearhead was. The exception being the Confederate Locust which was deployed to be able to run around the flank of the Union to harass from the rear.

Union came on the board from the “north” (short edge of the board on the left of most photos) and “east” (long edge where Antietam is written).
For the most part early on I stayed relatively static and fired at incoming Union mechs. Aside from my Locust which ran to flank the enemy Stalker. Early I was able to knock the Stalker down with combined fire from a Shadow Hawk and Locust which took out a gyro and then caused a failed pilot check, downing the Stalker. The Locust then spent more time kicking and point blank firing on the Stalker, eventually at some point knocking the pilot out.

In the north of the map, the Union Thunderbolt took a lot of fire. Heavy damage to the right side, eventually blowing the right arm off in turn 5.

In turn six during a punching match the Thunderbolt was critically punched and exploded. The Confederate Thug traded fire with everyone but got knocked down twice by the Union Urbie firing an up gunned AC20.

Eventually the Urbie got both legs blown off. Still able to prop itself up in its arms it continued to fire until out of AC20 ammo and punched out.

Early during the slug match, the Union Locust ran past the fighting to collect stars. The Confederate Warhammer briefly peeled off to shoot at it, but the Locust was sprinting too fast. The Confederate command center tried to fire, but had few chances thanks to terrain. The Locust ended up running down the road collecting points.

The Shadow Hawks on both sides, Union Orion, and Confederate Ostsol ended up in slugging matches. The Ostsol punched a Union Orion right in the cockpit killing the pilot, then went over to the second Shadow Hawk which had been knocked down and kicked the cockpit killing a second Union pilot on turn 6. That was the explosive finish to combat at the bottom of turn 6 which was the last of the turns we played.

By that point it was very late in the night and we called an end to fighting at the bottom of turn 6 rather than fighting to the bitter end of turn 15. Most Union mechs were dead aside from a single Shadow Hawk and the Locust which was running off the map. The Stalker was technically alive but pilot still knocked out and had been getting damaged constantly. The Union was winning in points thanks to the Locust which had broken through the lines.

Throughout the battle, there were a lot of historical parallels throughout the game, including the Union taking higher casualties but still considering the battle a win. Historically poor Union leadership contributed to casualties and the Union player had (for purely flavor reasons) declared his general to be in the Stalker right before it got knocked out of the fight and we agreed that loss of leadership lead to his string of poor combat rolls immediately after during the initial Union assault. Locations like the sunken road and Dunken church which were historical hotspots were exactly where the heaviest mech fighting was. The poor Urbie getting both of its legs blown off couldn’t be ignored as such a sterotypical sort of Civil War wound.

Overall this was a very fun scenario to play. There were some crazy rolls including the early downing of the Union Stalker, the Union Urbie twice knocking the Confederate Thug off its feet, the two pilot kills by the Confederate Ostsol, and the crazy sprinting past all weapons fight by the Union Locust.